


In which Tony Stark is absolutely not a princess

by LauraS26



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Dragons, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-19
Updated: 2016-09-19
Packaged: 2018-08-15 23:37:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8077879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LauraS26/pseuds/LauraS26
Summary: Tony Stark was a genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. He was also in the middle of being kidnapped by a fucking huge, scaly, iridescent dragon. 
"Excuse me?" He squawked, outraged. "Under this fine piece of tech, is a fine specimen of manliness. I may be rich, and beautiful, and on a few occasions we don't mention, I may have even worn a dress, but I can absolutely assure you, I'm the furthest thing from a princess!"





	1. The snatching of Tony Stark.

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first ever fanfic, and I actively encourage con crit. If you saw a mistake, spelling error, anything you wanna tell me about, go ahead. I don't have a Beta reader, so any mistakes are mine. Xx

Tony Stark was a genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. He was also in the middle of being kidnapped by a fucking huge, scaly, iridescent dragon. 

"What the hell! J.A.R.V.I.S! Dragon! I'm being kidnapped by a flying lizard!" 

Squirming wasn't really the same in the suit. It was fitted snug to prevent jostling when he flew, but with his entire body clasped in one of the creatures hands, arms pinned to his sides and chest pressed into its palm he thought a bit of panicked, ineffective struggling could be excused. 

Dragons. Seriously.

He had only been doing a perimeter sweep of the tower. An excuse to get in the suit and fly, no threats expected. Then again, who the hell expects to be plucked from the sky in the middle of New York by a mythical beast? 

A charged up unibeam erupted from the arc reactor in his chest and scorched deep into the flesh of his would be Tony-snatcher's palm. The thing made a sound between a roar and a screech, pretty much exactly how he imagined a wounded dragon would sound. 

It tossed him away, and JARVIS immediately stepped in to stabilise the suit until he could clear his head enough to take back control. Bless his beautiful, resurrected soul. His boy was getting all the upgrades when he got out of this scrape. All of them.

"Sir, I would suggest a strategic retreat. The unibeam appears to have caused some penetrating damage, but not enough to indicates you could defeat it unaided, without risking significant damage to yourself." 

His A.I. was right of course. He could see the dragons scaly hand, and while the skin was blackened and pink flesh peeked through, it didn't look all that deep. Shit.

Tony wasn't a genius for nothing. He probably couldn't beat the dragon, but no way in hell was he leading it back to his tower. That tower housed four of the only five people Tony allowed himself to love now. Rhodey was safe off being a little airforce minion, but J.A.R.V.I.S's main servers, and the bots were in there and he had no idea what this thing would do if he disappeared inside. 

The remaining Avengers were safe at the compound. Not that he cared or anything. Tony had been living alone at the tower with the bots since the Ultron fiasco, so no immediate backup would be forthcoming. It was just him and J.A.R.V.I.S against this thing.

The dragon was the colour of an oil sheen across the top of a puddle. An iridescent, muted rainbow lizard as big as a quinjet, with hands big enough to engulf Tony's entire torso and still have the claws touch, and opalescent, pale grey eyes the size of Tony's head, filled with shining points of silver and white and thundercloud grey. Oh, and it was currently hovering and staring at him in a way physics really shouldn't allow considering its size and the speed of its wing beats. 

Tony's brain kept throwing up calculations in the way it always did, and the answers came out wrong. His answers never came out wrong, which could only mean one thing. Fuck magic. Seriously.

The nervous babbling tangent in his head snapped to a halt when an altogether different voice replaced it. Dark and silky, it spoke clearly, straight into his mind. 

"Calm down little mortal". 

His thoughts stalled in panic. 

In his head. It was in his head, touching his mind! Touching the only good thing about him and he had no way to stop it. No defences. Nothing. He had nothing! No. No. Nononono. Please. Please don't let it take that from him. The great Tony stark, merchant of death, wastrel, whore, rich, arrogant bastard. The only part of him worth having was his mind, and now it was helpless and entirely at the mercy of a fucking dragon.

While his internal meltdown happened, externally, his shield of cocky assholery kicked in with barely a pause. "Soooo. Dragon. Big, huge talking dragon. Great, I love dragons! The names Tony. Tony Stark. You've probably heard of me. I'm a pretty busy guy and if it's all good with you I'm gonna head off. Things to do, tech to invent, minds to blow, and you can get back to whatever very important business talking dragons have. Right, good talk Norbert, see you around!" 

He was so glad for the voice modulator in the suit, for making his babble come out sounding almost as cocky as he hoped and not like the panicked, squeaky, word vomit it actually was. His tech really was the best.

He made to turn away with a blatantly fake, jaunty wave when the velvet voice returned, sounding entirely too amused. What had he said that was so funny?

"I am a dragon. I have decided, to be the best midgardian dragon, I must have the best midgardian princess for my hoard. As you rule at the top of the tallest tower, you will be my princess. You may come quietly, or you may struggle, but I will only catch you again. Facing downwards this time of course, so your clever little weapon will only fire uselessly between my talons." 

The voice gained a gently mocking edge, "I promise not to eat you, I'm sure your curious armour would give me dreadful heartburn."

"Excuse me?" He squawked, outraged. "Under this fine piece of tech, is a fine specimen of manliness. I may be rich, and beautiful, and on a few occasions we don't mention, I may have even worn a dress, but I can absolutely assure you, I'm the furthest thing from a princess!" 

Who knew dragons could look so smug? He scowled under the faceplate as the rude, horrible creature's huge eyes crinkled at the corners, and one side of the mouth tipped upwards in what was clearly a smirking . What an asshole.

"You don't have to lie princess" it cooed in a shit-eating voice that told Tony it knew perfectly well he wasn't a princess, but it was blatantly going to ignore that fact because it was a huge fucking troll. Oh my god. Were trolls a thing? Unicorns? Pixies? 

He couldn't help a small smirk as the image of Fury ranting at his SHIELD minions, covered from eyepatch to sweeping coat hem in pixie dust.

"Oh my god are pixies a thing? Because I need to talk to one." The dragons grin faded a little as it squinted at him in confusion.

"Your mind must be a fascinating place little mortal. I'd love to be able to open it up and just look inside." It gave an exaggerated sigh and hangdog expression -that Tony didn't buy for a second!- "but alas my mental abilities are not so great-".

Before Tony could fully process slightly tentative relief, the dragon darted forward. Snatching him out of the air, between one blink and the next he was out of the New York sky, and into a huge, dimly lit cave, more than big enough for the dragon to move around comfortably. The smug voice continued "-my teleportation is excellent however!"

The end of the sentence didn't register as a tide of panic rose to drag Tony under.

Chest heaving as he started to hyperventilate, he clawed uselessly at the smooth surface of the faceplate. JARVIS swiftly slid it open and he took quick, gulping breaths. His face turned red and tears started to leak from the corners of his glazed eyes.

"No! No! I won't do it! I won't. I won't." He whimpered, one hand clutching protectively over the arc reactor as the other braced him where he had fallen, trembling, to his hands and knees. He had resisted torture in a cave in Afghanistan for three months, there was nothing that could be done to him now that would make him build another weapon. He could take anything he had to. He probably deserved it anyway.

After Ultron, his hands were so steeped in innocent blood it would take ten lifetimes to get them clean. Tony would die in agony before he would add to that. He deserved this. He deserved to be tortured in a cave by a dragon. He was a murderer after all. 

Images filled his head, the soldiers from the car that died protecting him In Afghanistan(too weak), people he had failed to rescue on missions(too slow), victims of Ultron(too reckless, your fault, all your fault). The insidious voice of self loathing hissed to him.

"-rk! Stark!" The weird rumbling voice in his head was accompanied by a massive claw coming to rest just above the arc reactor. "What is wrong?" It sort of sounded like it actually cared. Weird. He was Tony Stark, people only cared about his money, his fame, and his weapons. Why would someone be worried for him now? It wasn't J.A.R.V.I.S's voice, or Rhodey's. 

Tony Stark doesn't deserve good things. He had really beaten all the odds finding Rhodey at MIT. Finding Pepper on top of that had been unbelievable. It had seemed too good to be true, and he had pushed and pushed trying to figure out what she was after. He'd had his trust broken, been beaten down, and used, and betrayed far too many times to believe in her goodness so easily. After months he had let her in a little, extended a little trust, and she had taken it and proved herself over and over until she carved out a little place for herself in his battered, damaged heart. It took being in a relationship with him to drive her away.

There were five people in the world Tony still let himself care about, and he built four of them himself.

That was a lie, but he told his shredded heart to shut up. If they didn't care enough to stay, he didn't care either. Right. 

Even if the tower did seem cold without cap lounging with a sketchbook in the common room, or Brucie bear in the kitchen cooking something from a recipe he picked up in Outer Mongolia. Thor wasn't always around, but he didn't miss the boisterous joy of the man as he greeted the 'Man of Iron!'. He especially didn't miss the mini heart attacks as he turned round to find one of the spysassin twins. Right. There.

No, Tony didn't care, he was alone now, with his creations, and he knew he didn't deserve even that, but he wouldn't make the debt on his soul any worse. 

"Don't care, cant make me. Never gonna build you weapons." His mind was sort of aware what was going on around him, but being back in a cave had sent his consciousness curling away inside while fear, and hopeless determination, and memories reigned. 

He barely registered the voice in his head becoming true sound, the strange colours and textures making way for more solid, but no less smooth words.

The next thing he registered was a man kneeling over him with palms on his cheeks. The suit was open around him, but not torn or damaged. "Breathe with me stark" The dragon, no, the man insisted and Tony's mind sputtered gradually back up to speed like an old car. 

The suit was open but not damaged, so most likely JARVIS had deemed the man safe enough to make him vulnerable, which was calming. Also the mans face blocked the view of the cave roof above him.

"Don't move" he croaked. The man arched an eyebrow in imperious question, but didn't move while he slowly regulated his breathing. Huffing a final sigh he closed his eyes. "I'm afraid of caves." He didn't want to see the scorn in the face of this stranger at such a pathetic overreaction, so he didn't open them.


	2. In which the Avengers assemble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is a bit shorter, but I struggled to write Steve's POV. Also, don't expect all the chapters to come out this quickly. 
> 
> Hopefully next chapter will be funnier when we get back to Princess Tony and the dragon! I hope you enjoy this one anyway! Xx

Steve was sitting in the kitchen of the Avengers compound when the alarm sounded. It wasn't the usual assemble alarm. He hadn't been aware that there was more than one sound programmed, but, he thought with wistful fondness, with Tony, one of anything was never enough.

Sam came hustling into the kitchen in his workout gear, panting lightly. "What's going on? Do I need to be suited up?"

Vision drifted up behind his shoulder, drawn by the sound, followed immediately by Nat. Of course, she was fully dressed and immaculate as always. Wanda showed up shortly afterwards, all eyes looking to Steve for answers.

"I don't know. F.R.I.D.A.Y?"

The wailing alarm cut off abruptly.

"Apologies for the intrusion Captain Rogers, but it appears Sir has been kidnapped." The shockingly familiar electronic voice paused, as if he couldn't believe the absurdity of his next words. "By a dragon".

Sam choked on nothing. "Did you just say a dragon? I'm gonna ignore the fact that you're not the usual voice from the ceiling in favour of that." He looked around at the others for backup.

"...What the hell? _J.A.R.V.I.S?"_ Steve was torn between suspicion at the voice of the deceased A.I., amusement at the ridiculousness of the statement, and incredulous worry that it was true, and Tony really was in danger.

He turned helplessly to Vision. "J.A.R.V.I.S. was destroyed creating you, can you tell if this is an impostor before we do anything"

"The coding is a direct match for my predecessor, Captain. I'm not certain how this came to pass." The synthezoid's eyes flashed as he mentally communicated with the A.I.

"It's fine Vis. If it's really him, then Tony really is in trouble." The hovering man inclined his head, still apparently lost in mental discussion.

"Nat, get an earpiece in, get ready and prepare the quinjet." The spy nodded, and he knew J.A.R.V.I.S. would keep her filled in through the earpiece as she left to take care of it.

"What else can you tell us J.A.R.V.I.S?" 

If Tony was in trouble, despite having left them they would do anything in their power to get him back. _Steve_ would do anything...

He would do what it took to make sure the man he had fallen in love with was safe, even if it meant he took him back to his tower, away from Steve all over again. The thought of it made his heart ache. 

He might love the other man, and wasn't it an amazing thought, it being allowed for two men to be together _like that_ now, but Tony clearly didn't feel the same way. And Steve had no right to expect him to.

Regardless of anything. Tony needed help, and he would always have Steve's.

"Eight minutes ago, while flying a sweep outside the tower, Sir was snatched by a large winged reptile. He attempted to attack, and broke free of its hold, but after a strike from the unibeam did negligible damage he agreed that retreat was necessary."

Steve winced. Something that could take a direct strike from the suits unibeam was a hell of a threat. His mind raced, but there wasn't much he could come up with without more information. Body shape. Weak points. Vulnerabilities and openings.

A soft whir sounded, and as if the A.I. knew what he was thinking, one of the walls lit up with footage of the creature from what looked like the suit's helmet cam, with the sound muted. He eyed them gratefully, searching out clues that would indicate what he needed.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome captain."

"Sir begun to speak aloud about talking dragons and I can only infer that some form of telepathic communication was taking place."

The A.I. sounded as put out at the thought of magic as his creator would. Steve was smart, and adaptable, and rapidly getting a grip on the tech of the future, but Tony's work always left him in awe. When he had created J.A.R.V.I.S., the inventor had undeniably created true life.

"After that, the dragon utilised some form of teleportation to appear next to sir, grabbed him from the air, and vanished. I am completely cut off from my connection to the part of myself stored in the suit, and have no way of determining sirs whereabouts or state of wellbeing."

The artificial being sounded lost.

"I have only just been reunited with sir. I do not want to lose him."

Steve's heart throbbed. He knew what it was like to lose someone you had only just regained. 

He thought of Bucky. His best friend and brother, fallen from a train. Then seeing him again. That fierce shocked joy that shot through him as the winter soldier's muzzle fell, and that familiar, beloved face was revealed. Thinking for a moment that somehow, miraculously, he had his best friend back. Then the utter heartbreak following the confused " _Who the hell is Bucky?"_.

He wouldn't let J.A.R.V.I.S. lose his father, after whatever miracle had brought them back together.

"Ok guys, suit up and meet at the quinjet ready for wheels up in ten. We'll review what we know and get more details from J.A.R.V.I.S. on the way." 

He left the team to get sorted while he ran to swap his civvies for the armoured suit and cowl Stark had created for him, and grab the shield. Tony did so much for them. He sorely regretted how coldly he had spoken to the inventor the last time they had seen each other. He'd been a real ass.

\-----------

"Coward. You're just gonna run off to your tower with your tail between your legs, huh Stark? Can't handle a bit of responsibility for your actions?" 

Why couldn't he stop spouting the vitriol pouring from his lips? 

_No, Tony, I know it's not all your fault. Please._

He knew he was just lashing out, hurt and upset that Tony was leaving them. Leaving _him._ But Tony didn't owe him anything. He was being a bully. Ma would be ashamed.

Tony had only one of many parts to play in the Ultron debacle, but he was being treated like he had deliberately unleashed the murderous intelligence on the world.

Treated like Bruce and Tony hadn't worked together on the project, and like the sceptre hadn't taken their work, twisted it, and set it free. Like he would _ever_ willingly have created the thing that shredded J.A.R.V.I.S.. Shredded his son.

Wanda was more to blame than Tony even, having willingly worked against them with the mad program, so why was he, why were they all treating Tony like it was all on him? No wonder he was leaving.

Tony gave that heartbreakingly fake smirk of his. "Guess so. I- see you around Rogers." He walked away towards his car.

It wasn't just them treating him this way, clearly the genius was beating himself up over it too. 

Who would be there for him at the tower, with J.A.R.V.I.S. destroyed, Miss Potts left, and colonel Rhodes back on duty with the Air Force? Who would keep him from drinking himself to death, and make sure he slept and ate enough?

_Please Tony, wait!_

Why couldn't he speak? Tell the genius that he was beautiful, and kind, and that Steve loved him? Beg him not to go? 

Steve just stood there, like a statue, cold to his heart as Tony gave one last wave, got in the car, and drove away.

_Please._  
\----------

The ramp of the quinjet shut, and the avengers settled into seats as Nat took the controls and prepared to lift off. J.A.R.V.I.S. took control of the sound system to continue talking to them.

"I have footage of the event from multiple sources, the clearest being the external security feed from the tower, and the direct view from sirs suit camera. I am sending the feeds through now."

Holographic screens shone down from the plane's ceiling, yet another gift from Tony, showing the two views.

They headed the plane towards Ave- no, _Stark_ tower, while they continued to plan. When the Avengers had relocated to the compound, the name had been changed back to Stark tower.

Steve, Sam, Wanda, Nat, Vision. They were a team, but they didn't feel like a _family_. Not the way the original Avengers had before. 

Before, when Steve would wake up, and shuffle down to the kitchen and find Nat twirling a knife idly. Blatantly using it as a threat to keep the two sulky scientists at the dining table, when they clearly wanted nothing more than to still be in their labs after a forty eight hour Science! Marathon. Tony who was kidnapped, and Bruce, out there somewhere on the run.

Before, when he could head down to the gym and get a proper, all out, physical spar with Thor, and not have to reign in his strength. Thor, back in Asgard taking care of his royal duties. Still there if they needed him, but not a permanent part of the team anymore.

Before, when he could sit in the lounge with Clint, tv on with no sound, and sketch quietly while the archer practiced his lipreading. Clint, who was retired with his _secret family_. Seriously.

He felt like everything was falling apart, and he didn't know how to hold it together. How to hold this team together. But right now he had Tony to worry about. Then he could think of himself, and the future of the team. But for now, _Tony_.


End file.
